Vegas uses late push to complete comeback win in OT on road over Winnipeg

The Vegas Golden Knights scored a late power play goal in the third period to send the game into overtime before securing the comeback victory in the extra period.

The Golden Knights defeated the Winnipeg Jets, 4-3, Thursday, Dec. 12, from the Canada Life Centre. Vegas is now on an eight-game winning streak against Winnipeg after this game.

“We’ve been off for a while, so I thought we might be rusty early,” head coach Bruce Cassidy said. “But I thought after the first period that we executed better.”

With the win, Vegas improved their record to 19-7-3 this season. It’s 41 points on the season keeps them four points ahead of the Los Angeles Kings for first place in the Pacific Division.

The Knights improved their record to 8-4-3 on the road and 3-3 in overtime games this season. In their past six road games, the VGK has been 5-0-1, which is its best stretch on the road in franchise history.

Thursday night’s game was the second of three meetings between the Golden Knights and Jets. Vegas also won the first meeting at home, 4-3, back on Nov. 29. Their next matchup will be back at home in Nevada on April 3.

Thursday’s game was the first of a three-game road trip for VGK.

Their next game will be Saturday, Dec. 14 against the Edmonton Oilers. Puck drop is scheduled for 1 p.m. at Rogers Place.

“We’re just a little more detail-oriented now,” Cassidy said. “I think some of it is just being able to work on it in practice […] So now we’ve been able to button down on some things, that’s made us better.”

After the six-day hiatus since last playing, the Golden Knights returned to action on the road featuring a little rust going scoreless until the third period.

Vegas finally found the back of the net when right-wing Keegan Kolesar scored an unassisted goal to get them on the board.

“We stayed with it right to the very end,” Kolesar said. “We didn’t let it waver in any way in our play.”

Kolesar’s goal was his seventh of the season.

“We just need to stick with it, the game is 60 minutes for a reason right,” Kolesar said. “ If something doesn’t go our way in the first minute or whatever it may be, we got another 59 minutes to play.”

The VGK found themselves down by one with less than three minutes left and then they got a power play. Then less than 20 seconds later, the Golden Knights got another power play opportunity to have a 5-3 advantage on the ice.

Vegas made sure to capitalize when right-wing Victor Olofsson found the back of the net off assists from captain Mark Stone and defenseman Shea Theodore to send the game into overtime.

“We just kept playing the same way the entire game,” Olofsson said. “And we finally got paid for it at the end.”

The clutch goal off the power play was Olofsson’s fourth goal of the season. As for the captain, Stone’s assist was his 17th on the season.

“We hung in there,” Cassidy said. “We got some calls late, we needed them obviously. And our power play was able to connect there.”

Now with the momentum on their side, center Ivan Barbashev lit the lamp with help from Theodore in overtime to win the game. Barbashev’s game-winning goal was his 14th of the season.

It was another multi-point performance for Theodore, as his two assists increased his season total to 21.

“We just kept playing the same way, we didn’t have to change anything,” Olofsson said. “Overtime is obviously a little different than the rest of the game, I think we played a good overtime too. That was a really nice play from Theodore to Barbashev, it was nice to get the win.”

Due to being able to rest for almost an entire week, goalie Adin Hill got the start at goalie for the Knights. By the final buzzer, he finished with 18 saves on 20 shots on goal for a .900 save percentage. He improved his record to 13-4-2 on the season.

Besides Hill, the VGK defense pretty much played a good, clean game.

“We were down 2-1 in the third and I thought we were playing really well, especially defensively,” Cassidy said. “[Winnipeg] looked tired.”

They only committed one penalty throughout the game and made sure to kill the Jets’ only power play opportunity. The Golden Knights also finished with more hits, faceoffs won, and takeaways; while also committing less giveaways.

“Numbers wise, I thought it was one of our best [defensive] games of the year,” Cassidy said. “We have been better for probably the better part of a month now. We should be, we got good defensive players that played that way before.”